The announcement was a family affair. Kavanaugh was joined by his wife Ashley, and daughters Margaret and Liza. His parents were at the White House, seated in the audience next to first lady Melania Trump.

‘Mr. President, I am grateful to you, and I’m humbled by your confidence in me,’ Kavanaugh said. ‘Justice Kennedy devoted his career to securing liberty. I am deeply honored to be nominated to fill his seat on the Supreme Court.’

In his remarks, Kavanaugh touted his strong record with women throughout his career, noting he’s hired a majority of female law clerks and that Elena Kagan, who is now on the Supreme Court, hired him to teach at Harvard.

Kavanaugh also paid tribute to his parents, who were both lawyers.

‘My mom was a trail blazer,’ he said, noting she went to law school when he was 10 years old and became a prosecutor. ‘The president introduced me tonight as Judge Kavanaugh but, to me, that title will always belong to my mom.’

His remarks were filled with stories about his family and his appreciation of them.

He noted both is daughters love sports and joked his young daughter Liza ‘loves sports and she loves to talk.’ He then gave her a high five.

He added that he’s coached both of his daughters’ basketball teams, where he’s called ‘Coach K.’

He and his wife met when they both worked at the Bush White House and their first date was September 10, 2001 – the night before the terrorist attacks.

‘Ashley was a source of strength for President Bush and everyone in this building,’ he said of the aftermath. ‘I thank God every day for my family.’

Kavanaugh’s remarks were filled with light-hearted stories like the above, making the audience laugh and showing his all-American appeal that Trump was said to be looking for his pick. His talk was focused on the personable with little conversation on his judicial record.

Judge Kavanaugh’s remarks were filled with light-hearted stories about his family

Judge Kavanaugh will replace Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court

Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh speaks after his nomination

But he did make an appeal to the Senate that will confirm him.

‘I will tell each Senator that I revere the constitution,’ he said.

‘My judicial philosophy is straight forward – a judge must be independent and interpret the law, not make the law,’ he said. ‘A judge must interpret the constitution as written.’

‘If confirmed by the Senate I will strive to keep an open mind in every case,’ Kavanaugh noted. ‘And I will always strive to preserve the constitution in the United States.’

Kavanaugh was a front-runner for the nomination ever since Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy announced his retirement on June 27.

Trump, in his announcement, indicated he wanted a judge that followed his successful first Supreme Court nominee, Neil Gorsuch.

The president noted Kavanaugh, like Gorsuch, clerked for Kennedy. Gorsuch and Kavanaugh also went to the same high school.

Gorsuch’s confirmation is considered one of the major successes of the Trump administration.

But Kavanaugh’s long record – 12 years as a judge, nearly 300 written opinions, a multitude of scholarly articles, a paperwork trail from his time in the Bush White House, and thousands of documents from when he served on the Starr investigation – has raised concerns Democrats will have an embarrassment of riches to use in questions during confirmation hearings, leading to a lengthened process and a tough confirmation vote.

As he did with Gorsuch barely 10 days after taking office last year, the president introduced Kavanaugh to a packed East Room at the White House and challenged the U.S. Senate to confirm his nominee without delay.

The Gorsuch nomination was seen as an even political swap for the deceased Justice Antonin Scalia, one rock-ribbed conservative for another.

Replacing Kennedy, often seen as a ‘swing vote’ on tight 5-4 decisions with enormous societal implications, with a conservative nominee is a far weightier exercise.

George W. Bush’s chief political strategist Karl Rove and White House staff secretary Brett Kavanaugh step off Marine One in October 2004. They were traveling with Bush to support his reelection campaign. (Paul J. Richards/AFP/Getty Images)

With Breanne Deppisch and Joanie Greve

THE BIG IDEA: Brett Kavanaugh is no David Souter.

President Trump’s nominee to replace Justice Anthony M. Kennedy on the Supreme Court made a name for himself as a partisan warrior when he worked for Ken Starr and has proved his reliability as a consistently conservative judge over a dozen years on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.

Majority Leader Mitch McConnell reportedly told Trump that Kavanaugh’s lengthy paper trail over a quarter of a century in the public arena would make it harder to confirm him through the narrowly divided Senate than two of the other finalists being considered.

But the same track record that could cause headaches in the next several weeks is exactly what made Kavanaugh so appealing to leaders of the Republican legal establishment, including Federalist Society chief Leonard Leo and White House counsel Don McGahn, who wanted someone they feel confident they can count on for the next generation.

Kavanaugh, who has long been active in the Federalist Society, fits that bill. He was one of Starr’s top bulldogs as the independent counsel investigated Bill Clinton and at times advocated internally for an even more aggressive approach against the Democratic president. Kavanaugh was a lead author of the Starr Report and has acknowledged writing portions that laid out grounds for impeachment.

He was deeply involved in the exploration of Clinton White House lawyer Vince Foster’s suicide, which Trump suggested in 2016 might have been a murder. Kavanaugh even appeared before the Supreme Court in a bid to subpoena notes taken by a lawyer whom Foster spoke with shortly before he died.

Kavanaugh represented the American relatives of Elián González pro bono as they tried to prevent the boy from being sent back to Cuba, a cause celebre on the right in 1999 and 2000.

He helped defend Jeb Bush’s school voucher plan in the Florida courts and then worked on George W. Bush’s legal team during the 2000 recount. Then he got a job in the White House Counsel’s Office under Alberto Gonzales, helping pick Bush’s judicial nominees. From there, he was promoted to staff secretary, which gave him more direct access to the president and control of the paper flow into the Oval Office.

Bush nominated Kavanaugh to the appeals court in 2003, but Democrats held up his confirmation for three years because of his polarizing work for Starr. At the time, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) called him the “Forrest Gump of Republican politics” because he seemed to be in the thick of every controversial legal fight that gripped the capital. Kavanaugh was eventually confirmed in 2006 as part of a larger deal on nominations by a vote of 57 to 36.

Since joining the court, Kavanaugh has written about 300 opinions — including key decisions on guns, abortion and regulation. He ruled that the way the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is structured makes it unconstitutional, for instance, and has routinely taken the side of big business in disputes with government.

George H.W. Bush nominated Souter for the Supreme Court in 1990 at the recommendation of then-White House Chief of Staff John H. Sununu. Souter was on the New Hampshire Supreme Court but hadn’t ruled on hot-button issues, so he emerged as a consistently liberal vote once on the high court. No one who knows Kavanaugh doubts that he will pull the court to the right if confirmed.

Based on Kavanaugh’s votes on the D.C. Circuit, a political scientist at Emory University calculates that there is a 55 percent chance that he will be further to the right than Clarence Thomas and an 81 percent chance that he will be to the right of Chief Justice John Roberts:

Wondering how #conservative#Kavanaugh is? I just estimated preferences from all voting by DC Circuit judges on en banc cases Ih/t Mike Giles). I estimate he is the fifth most conservative of the 47 judges for whom I have data.

McConnell recognizes that Kavanaugh’s nomination presents a target-rich environment for Democrats, who have dozens of potential avenues of attack because there are so many cases and episodes to choose from. Even though Kavanaugh is likely to ultimately make it through the Senate, there are enough unpopular positions he has staked out that most of the Democrats from red states should not have that hard of a time finding palatable justifications to oppose his nomination. (It’s always possible they’ll vote for him anyway if he already has the votes to get confirmed.)

Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings also ensure that some of the darkest chapters of the Bush era will be re-litigated, including the use of enhanced interrogation techniques.

— Importantly for Trump, though, Kavanaugh’s views on executive power have evolved significantly since he worked for Starr. In a 2009 article for the Minnesota Law Review, Kavanaugh noted that the Starr team he worked on operated under a “badly flawed” law, “particularly the extent to which it allowed civil suits against presidents to proceed while the President is in office.”

More recently, Kavanaugh has argued that presidents should not be distracted by civil lawsuits, criminal investigations, or even questions from a prosecutor or defense attorney while in office, Michael Kranish and Ann E. Marimow report. “Having observed the weighty issues that can consume a president, Kavanaugh wrote, the nation’s chief executive should be exempt from ‘time-consuming and distracting’ lawsuits and investigations, which ‘would ill serve the public interest, especially in times of financial or national security crisis.’ If a president were truly malevolent, Kavanaugh wrote, he could always be impeached.”

— Neil Gorsuch, who also served in the Bush administration, was pushed by legal activists on the right last year because he too was a known commodity and had been consistently conservative as a circuit court judge. He helped the Bush-Cheney reelection campaign in 2004 as a volunteer lawyer in Ohio. When he was interviewing for a senior job at the Justice Department, then-Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman emailed a top White House official to put in a good word. “He is a true loyalist,” Mehlman wrote of his former roommate.

Meet Brett Kavanaugh, Trump’s Supreme Court nominee

President Trump announced July 9 that Brett M. Kavanaugh will be the Supreme Court nominee to fill Justice Kennedy’s vacant seat.(Monica Akhtar/The Washington Post)

GET TO KNOW KAVANAUGH:

— He is just 53 years old. An avid runner, Kavanaugh could realistically spend four decades on the Supreme Court. He finished the Boston Marathon in 3:59:45 in 2010 and 4:08:36 in 2015.

— He has an elite pedigree. His father ran a cosmetics trade association here for decades. His mother was a high school teacher who became a lawyer and then a judge. Kavanaugh attended Yale for both undergrad and law school after attending Georgetown Preparatory School. Gorsuch, whose mom ran the Environmental Protection Agency, was a classmate at the elite private high school in Washington. The two then clerked for Kennedy at the same time.

Kavanaugh also clerked in San Francisco for Judge Alex Kozinski on the Ninth Circuit, who retired in December after 15 women alleged that he had subjected them to inappropriate sexual behavior.

The D.C. Circuit, where he serves now, is considered the second most important court in the land, only after the Supreme Court. Current justices John Roberts, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Clarence Thomas were each elevated from there.

— Kavanaugh identifies as an originalist. “A judge must interpret the Constitution as written, informed by history and tradition and precedent,” he said last night. (Note the difference between being “informed” by precedent and being bound by it. Those are two very different things.)

— Trump called Kavanaugh to tell him on Sunday night and informed Kennedy of his decision on Monday, per a senior White House official. “Kavanaugh’s link to the Bush political dynasty gave Trump pause during the search process, and he peppered associates with questions about whether ‘my base’ would embrace him,” Robert Costa, Robert Barnes and Felicia Sonmez report. “But ultimately, prodded by top advisers and veteran Republicans, Trump decided that Kavanaugh’s lengthy conservative judicial record made up for any lingering concerns about how some of his core supporters would view the pick.”

— As Kavanaugh praised the president during his speech in the East Room, you could see why he fared so well during his interview with Trump. “No president has ever consulted more widely or talked with more people from more backgrounds to seek input about a Supreme Court nomination,” Kavanaugh said, as the president smiled.

— With Roe v. Wade hanging in the balance, Kavanaugh went out of his way to emphasize his relationships with women. He laid it on thick: “My mom was a trailblazer,” he said. “When I was 10, she went to law school and became a prosecutor. My introduction to law came at our dinner table when she practiced her closing arguments. Her trademark line was ‘Use your common sense. What rings true, what rings false?’ That’s good advice for a juror — and for a son.”

“For the past 11 years, I have taught hundreds of students, primarily at Harvard Law School. … I remain grateful to the dean who hired me, Justice Elena Kagan.”

“I am proud that a majority of my law clerks have been women.”

“I have two spirited daughters, Margaret and Liza. Margaret loves sports, and she loves to read. Liza loves sports, and she loves to talk. I have tried to create bonds with my daughters like my dad created with me. … For the past seven years, I have coached my daughters’ basketball teams. The girls on the team call me Coach K.”

Kavanaugh’s wife, Ashley, was Bush 43’s longtime personal secretary: “Our first date was on September 10, 2001. The next morning I was a few steps behind her as the Secret Service shouted at all of us to sprint out the front gates of the White House, because there was an inbound plane. In the difficult weeks that followed, Ashley was a source of strength for President Bush and for everyone in this building.”

— Fun fact: The president’s big reveal preempted another reality TV show: “The Bachelorette” paused during Trump’s speech for a special report, and then ABC went back after Trump gave a metaphorical rose to Kavanaugh.

— “Not since Warren Harding in 1921 nominated former President William Howard Taft to be chief justice has the country been presented with a high court nominee so completely shaped by the needs and mores of the executive branch as Brett Kavanaugh,” Garrett Epps, who teaches constitutional law at the University of Baltimore, notes in The Atlantic. “Though Kavanaugh served as Kennedy’s law clerk during the October 1993 term, the contrast between the two men could hardly be more complete. Kennedy’s roots lay in his days of small-town private practice; he made his way to the bench from private practice, and, as a judge, he was conservative but independent. Kavanaugh has been the creature and servant of political power all his days. It would be the height of folly to expect that, having attained his lifetime’s ambition of a seat on the Supreme Court, he will become anything else.”

As President Trump announced his nominee for the Supreme Court, senators and activists demonstrated outside the Supreme Court building in Washington.(Jordan Frasier /The Washington Post)

THE CONFIRMATION BATTLE AHEAD:

— Because Kavanaugh is already so well known on Capitol Hill, the partisan battle lines are mostly drawn:

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah): “I will lift heaven and Earth to see that he is confirmed.”

— Every Democratic senator who was invited to attend the announcement at the White House declined, including Joe Manchin III (W.Va.), Heidi Heitkamp (N.D.), Doug Jones (Ala.) and Joe Donnelly (Ind.). Incidentally, so did Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), who says she supports abortion rights and could be pivotal. On the other side, Nevada Sen. Dean Heller — the most vulnerable Republican up for reelection in 2018 — proudly sat in the front row.

— Americans for Prosperity, which is part of the Koch network, announced plans to spend “seven figures” on paid advertising and “grassroots engagement” in support of Kavanaugh’s confirmation. The GOP-aligned Judicial Crisis Network separately says it will spend $1.4 million on TV ads in the next week touting Kavanaugh in Alabama, Indiana, North Dakota and West Virginia.

— A good illustration of how Republicans are likely to fall in line: Kavanaugh ruled in 2015 that “the Government’s metadata collection program is entirely consistent with the Fourth Amendment.” If a Democratic nominee wrote that, there is no doubt that the libertarian-minded Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) would come out swinging against his or her nomination. Instead, Rand tweeted last night he has an “open mind,” and GOP aides say privately that they don’t think he’ll pose any kind of a problem.

Story 2: President Trump Flies To Europe for 7 Days for NATO Summit in Brussells and Meeting With Prime Minister May in England and Russian President Putin — Time To Step Up Military Spending of NATO Member Countries — Videos

Trump pushes NATO allies to keep spending commitments

Trump to NATO members: Pay up

NATO contributions country-by-country

Trump takes on NATO over defense spending

President Trump Pressure NATO Allies Ahead of Summit – ENN 2018-07-10

NATO vs BRICS – What’s The Difference & How Do They Compare?

How many NATO member states are there?

Trump takes shots at NATO, May but praises Putin as he prepares to meet with alliance leaders

President Donald Trump on July 10 spoke about the upcoming NATO summit in Brussels, his meeting with Putin and Boris Johnson’s resignation. (The Washington Post)

Philip Rucker, Michael Birnbaum and William BoothWashington Post

President Donald Trump signaled he was ready for a transatlantic brawl Tuesday as he embarked on a consequential week of international diplomacy, taking aim at vulnerable British Prime Minister Theresa May and suggesting that meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin might be easier than talking with Western allies at the NATO summit here.

Leaders converged on Brussels fearful of what the combative U.S. president might say or do to rupture the liberal world order, with some European diplomats privately predicting calamity.

As he departed Washington on Tuesday, Trump stoked the deep divisions in May’s government to undermine the leader of America’s closest historic ally on the eve of the NATO meeting. Asked if May should remain in power, Trump said, “That’s up to the people,” while also complimenting her top rival, Boris Johnson.

Some of Europe’s counters to Trump, including May and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, arrive with heavy domestic political baggage of their own, making them vulnerable in negotiations with Trump as they seek to protect the Western alliance from his impulses on defense spending and trade.

Trump has long prized his instincts for taking advantage of an adversary’s weaknesses, and referred to the “turmoil” confronting May at home in remarks to reporters.

The prime minister faces a rebellion from advocates of a hard break from the European Union, who say she has been waffling, and is in danger of losing control. Johnson, a potential successor to May, resigned Monday as foreign secretary and reportedly savaged her Brexit plan as “a big turd.”

Trump praised him in personal terms: “Boris Johnson is a friend of mine. He’s been very, very nice to me and very supportive. And maybe we’ll speak to him when I get over there. I like Boris Johnson. I’ve always liked him.”

Trump’s seven-day journey begins in Brussels and will take him to England for his first visit there as president, to Scotland for a weekend respite at his private golf course and finally to Helsinki for his tête-à-tête with Putin. European leaders are as concerned about what concessions he might make to Putin – such as recognizing Russia’s annexation of Crimea from Ukraine – as they are about the chaos he could create at the NATO summit.

May plans to roll out the red carpet for Trump and first lady Melania Trump at a gala supper Thursday at Blenheim Palace, former prime minister Winston’s Churchill’s boyhood home, and at a luncheon Friday at Chequers, the prime minister’s country estate. She also secured him an audience with Queen Elizabeth II at Windsor Castle.

It was a startling gambit for Trump to risk offending his host by showering Johnson with praise while May faces threats of a revolt – even a no-confidence vote – by her own Conservative party over how she is handling Brexit.

“Trump goes after the weak people. He smells who is weak and who is strong, and he gets on well with the strong ones,” said Robin Niblett, director of the Chatham House, a prominent think tank in London.

To her critics, May is forever making compromises to carry out Brexit, even though she herself voted against leaving the European bloc. She has not helped her image by endlessly kicking the can down the road and delaying decisions.

Alternatively, Johnson could be seen as strong by Trump because he pushed for Brexit, he won – and when he didn’t get what he wanted, he quit. In a leaked audiotape, Johnson also praised Trump as the consummate dealmaker. “Imagine Trump doing Brexit. He’d go in bloody hard,” Johnson said. “There’d be all sorts of breakdowns, all sorts of chaos. Everyone would think he’d gone mad. But actually you might get somewhere.”

Trump seizing on perceptions of weakness in the diplomatic arena is in keeping with how he dealt with rival developers and other adversaries in real estate deals, according to Trump biographer Michael D’Antonio.

Donald J. Trump

✔@realDonaldTrump

Getting ready to leave for Europe. First meeting – NATO. The U.S. is spending many times more than any other country in order to protect them. Not fair to the U.S. taxpayer. On top of that we lose $151 Billion on Trade with the European Union. Charge us big Tariffs (& Barriers)!

“There are certain fail-safe bully tactics that can be employed when you’re the stronger, bigger kid,” D’Antonio said. “He is willing to be extreme and seek the upper hand, especially with people that he perceives to be polite and well-mannered.”

That impulse may be strongest this week with Merkel, who has been a stalwart against Trump’s disruptions in Europe but whose standing took a blow last month when she confronted the most serious leadership challenge in her 13-year rule of Germany.

Trump loathes Germany’s trade imbalance with the United States and feels the country is free-riding off the U.S. security umbrella. He also has long criticized Merkel for her 2015 decision to admit more than 1 million asylum seekers from Syria and elsewhere, warning that they were a proverbial Trojan horse who could destroy Europe’s way of life.

Trump has tried to spotlight any signs of Merkel’s political troubles, tweeting last month that “the people of Germany are turning against their leadership as migration is rocking the already tenuous Berlin coalition.”

In Brussels, Merkel will defend her decision to raise defense spending more slowly than Trump’s goal and seek to maintain the 35,000 U.S. troops deployed to Germany, which Trump has threatened to pull back.

But Merkel has actually benefited at home from Trump’s attacks, since the U.S. president is deeply unpopular among the German electorate, as he is with voters across much of western Europe.

Other sometimes-adversaries of Trump will be in Brussels as well, including French President Emmanuel Macron and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, creating the potential to extend disagreements that upended last month’s Group of Seven leaders summit in Quebec. Trump left that gathering without signing the perfunctory joint statement among the leaders that his aides had endorsed, and he proceeded to trash its host, Trudeau, as “weak” and “dishonest.”

Ahead of the NATO meetings that begin here Wednesday, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg tried to strike an optimistic note and play down the simmering disputes.

“Our summit comes at a time when some are questioning the strength of the transatlantic bond and I would not be surprised if we have robust discussions at the summit, including on defense spending,” Stoltenberg told reporters Tuesday. “Different views are normal among friends and allies, but I am confident that we will agree on the fundamentals.”

But European Council President Donald Tusk was more direct in anticipating that Trump may have designs on sowing discord, delivering a stinging warning to the visiting Americans president.

“Well, we do have a lot of allies,” he told reporters before boarding Marine One. “But we cannot be taken advantage of. We’re being taken advantage of by the European Union. We lost $151 billion last year on trade. And on top of that, we spend at least 70 percent for NATO. And, frankly, it helps them a lot more than it helps us. So we’ll see what happens. We have a long, beautiful week.”

Story 3: Will Prime Minister May Remain in Office? Brixit Breaks May — Videos

Try not to smirk too much, Boris: Johnson poses for picture of himself signing his lengthy resignation letter as he accuses May of letting ‘Brexit dream die’… and Jacob Rees-Mogg says he will make a ‘brilliant’ Prime Minister

Boris Johnson accused Theresa May of ‘suffocating’ Brexit as he sensationally resigned as Foreign Secretary

He declared war on the PM’s Chequers’s plan and said negotiators had ‘white flags fluttering above them’

But he came under fire after posing up for resignation photos which showed him signing the letter to the PM

Lib Dem MP Layla Moran called him a ‘poundshop Churchill impressionist’ and accused him of ‘running away’

Tory backbencher Jacob Rees-Mogg backed Mr Johnson and said he would make a ‘brilliant’ Prime Minister

Theresa May is fighting for her political life today after Boris Johnson accused her of killing Brexit and his allies backed him to be a ‘brilliant’ PM.

Mr Johnson used his decision to quit as Foreign Secretary to declare war on her Chequers plan for leaving the EU.

Warning that the UK was heading for colonial status, he said the Brexit dream was ‘dying – suffocated by self-doubt’.

He claimed Mrs May was sending negotiators ‘into battle with the white flags fluttering above them’ and surrendering control to Brussels. Following a chaotic day of resignations and rumours, Downing Street is now braced for a potential leadership challenge.

Sources insisted the Prime Minister would stand and fight for the national interest while her allies derided Mr Johnson, saying he offered no solutions on Brexit.

Boris also faced criticism in many quarters for taking the time to stage the photos of himself signing the resignation letter and was branded a ‘poundshop Churchill’.

In a reference to his decision to resign only after David Davis had quit as Brexit Secretary on Sunday night, one May loyalist said: ‘There’s not much honour in being second over the top.’

Mrs May also swiftly reshuffled her cabinet, bringing in Jeremy Hunt from Health to replace Boris as Foreign Secretary and Dominic Raab to replace Mr Davis.

But, in a significant intervention, Jacob Rees-Mogg last night backed Mr Johnson, saying he would make a ‘brilliant’ prime minister.

The former Foreign Secretary declared war on the PM’s Chequers plan, but came under fire after he posed up for resignation photos as he sensationally quit the Cabinet

Mr Johnson was branded a ‘poundshop Churchill impressionist’ for staging the photos by Lib Dem MP Layla Moran, who accused him of ‘running away like a coward’ after he sensationally quit the Cabinet.

Chris Heaton-Harris promoted to junior Brexit minister, replacing Steve Baker who followed his bossDavid Davis out of the door.

Kit Malthouse, an ally of Boris’ when he was Mayor of London, becomes Housing Minister.

Attorney General Jeremy Wright replaces Matt Hancock at Culture.

Barrister Geoffrey Cox replaces Wright as Attorney General.

Slamming the photos, Ms Moran, a leading member of the anti-Brexit group Best for Britain, said: ‘This staged resignation photograph is pathetic. This man is a poundshop Churchill impressionist. Its just very sad.

‘But Boris is doing what he does best: when the going gets tough he runs away like a coward.

‘He did it over Heathrow and he’s done it today. Rather than fight for the country he yet again cares only for his own self interest.

‘But at least he will have a little memento of the day his dreams came crashing down around him.’

Labour’s David Lammy said: ‘The fact that Boris Johnson arranged for a photoshoot of himself signing his resignation letter for the front pages tells us everything we need to know about him.

‘Self-obsessed, vain egomaniac devoid of substance caring only about himself and advancing his career. Good riddance.’

Sam Macrory, an ally of Nick Clegg, said: ‘We all know that Boris Johnson’s decision to quit is absolutely not about one man and his personal ambitions, but I’m struggling to think of another time where a Secretary of State called in the photographers to record the moment a resignation letter was signed.’

Gavin Sinclair said: ‘This sums up Boris – has a senior minister ever called in a photographer before resigning…and just before the PM’s statement to the Commons?!’

And Jon David Ellis criticised Mr Johnson’s behaviour in the aftermath of the Novichok poisonings, saying: ‘Boris literally posed with his resignation letter. Hours after a British citizen died from a foreign agent he chooses self image over basic dignity.’

More than 80 MPs attended a meeting of the pro-Brexit European Research Group, which Mr Rees-Mogg leads, in order to attack Mrs May’s Chequers plan. ‘This has got to be killed and it’s got to be killed before recess [in two weeks’ time],’ said one attendee.

Another Eurosceptic confirmed MPs were writing to the Tory 1922 Committee backbench group to trigger a no- confidence motion.

Boris Johnson’s resignation letter to Mrs May in which he said the Brexit ‘dream’ was being ‘suffocated by needless self-doubt’

Although the role of a PPS is often described as a ministerial ‘bag carrier’, it shows growing discontent within the Party and heightens speculation of a challenge to Theresa May’s leadership.

One said: ‘It’s over now. She’s done. It would be good if it were done quickly. I want to know who will be standing against her. We need to establish a new government because this offer is indefensible’.

One MP told the 1922 Committee that Mrs May had orchestrated a ‘Remain coup’ at Chequers on Friday. All four ‘great offices of state’ are now held by those who campaigned for Remain.

Friends of Mr Johnson, whose aide Conor Burns also resigned, were tight-lipped last night about his next move. But his resignation letter offered no support for Mrs May and, unlike Mr Davis, he did not urge MPs to back her.

Home Secretary Sajid Javid was among those to praise Mr Johnson yesterday, saying he would miss his ‘Reaganesque optimism and passion for global Britain’. On a day of turmoil at Westminster:

Eurosceptic MPs said more ministers would resign unless Mrs May backs down and abandons her Chequers plan;

It was rumoured the Eurosceptics are close to gathering the 48 names needed to force a vote of confidence in Mrs May;

Mr Davis stepped up his attack on Mrs May’s tactics, saying ‘we are giving too much away too easily – and that is a dangerous strategy’;

Steve Baker, who quit as Brexit minister, said the Establishment was trying to block Brexit;

Jeremy Hunt took over as Foreign Secretary, while Matt Hancock succeeded him as Health and Social Care Secretary;

Mr Davis’s former chief of staff Dominic Raab replaced him as Brexit Secretary;

Downing Street was forced to deny that Mrs May will offer ‘preferential’ access to the UK jobs market to EU citizens;

No 10 admitted that the customs arrangements signed off at Chequers may not be fully ready before the next election in 2022;

Mrs May told Tory MPs they had a duty to stick together to keep Jeremy Corbyn out of Downing Street.

In the Commons yesterday Mrs May paid tribute to both Mr Davis and Mr Johnson, who she said had displayed ‘passion’ for the Brexit cause. But in her reply to Mr Johnson’s attack last night, the PM noted that he had initially backed the plan at Chequers last week, reportedly choosing to toast her success with champagne.

Mrs May said she was ‘sorry – and a little surprised’ to receive his resignation ‘after the productive discussion we had at Chequers’.

One of her allies said: ‘For all the flowery language in his letter, what is conspicuous by its absence is anything resembling an alternative plan.

‘He moans about all these things but there is no sense of how he might achieve a different outcome. That is the difference.’

Jacob Rees-Mogg has said Mr Johnson will make an excellent Prime Minister after more than 80 MPs attended a meeting of the pro-Brexit European Research Group that he leads

How could Theresa May be ousted as Tory leader?

Theresa May faces a mortal threat to her leadership of the Conservative Party and Government.

A Tory leadership contest can be called in one of two ways – if Mrs May resigns or if MPs force and win a vote of no confidence in her.

Calling votes of no confidence is the responsibility of the chairman of the 1922 Committee, which includes all backbench Tory MPs.

Chairman Graham Brady is obliged to call a vote if 15 per cent of Tory MPs write to him calling for one – currently 48 MPs.

The process is secret and only Mr Brady knows how many letters he has received.

The procedure was last used in 2003 when Iain Duncan Smith was ousted as Tory leader.

If Mrs May is ousted, any MP is eligible to stand.

Conservative MPs will then hold a series of ballots to whittle the list of contenders down to two, with the last place candidate dropping out in each round.

The final two candidates are then offered to the Tory membership at large for an election.

Addressing the 1922 Committee, the Prime Minister acknowledged the controversy the Chequers deal had caused, but told MPs: ‘To lead is to decide.’ Outside the meeting, her supporters claimed she was in a better position following the resignations.

‘She is strengthened by all of this – it helps her,’ said Solicitor General Robert Buckland. ‘She has made decisions and the consequences are that some people feel they cannot be bound by collective responsibility, respect to them for resigning, but she has shown leadership.

‘This idea she is some sort of vacillator who cannot make her mind up and wants to keep everybody in the tent – no – she is showing leadership.’

Tory MP James Heappey said there was ‘huge support’ for Mrs May at the 1922 Committee. He said Brexiteers seeking to depose her ‘can do their worst, but it won’t be enough’.

In the Commons pro-Remain Tories, including Anna Soubry and Nicky Morgan, backed Mrs May. But the Prime Minister faced direct challenges from a string of Eurosceptic Tories.

Mr Rees-Mogg said her Brexit promises ‘have been watered down to the point that we are, or would be, in a semi-suspended state of membership of the European Union’.

He said the Cabinet resignations ‘really undermine the credibility of what was agreed at Chequers’.

Andrea Jenkyns, who quit the government to speak out on Brexit last month, said she would be writing a letter of no-confidence in Mrs May.

She said Mrs May’s premiership ‘is over… there’s a feeling we need a PM who believes in Brexit’.

Senior Conservative Sir Bernard Jenkin warned there had been a ‘massive haemorrhage of trust’ as a result of the direction the PM was taking and said it ‘may well come’ to a vote over her leadership.

In the Commons, Peter Bone accused Mrs May of betrayal. Mr Bone, who faced cries of ‘shame’, told the PM that activists in his Wellingborough constituency were questioning why they were still campaigning for the party.

Mrs May replied: ‘This is not a betrayal. We will end free movement. We will end the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice.

‘We will stop sending vast sums of money to the European Union every year.’

In full: Boris Johnson’s damning resignation letter to Theresa May

Dear Theresa

It is more than two years since the British people voted to leave the European Union on an unambiguous and categorical promise that if they did so they would be taking back control of their democracy.

They were told that they would be able to manage their own immigration policy, repatriate the sums of UK cash currently spent by the EU, and, above all, that they would be able to pass laws independently and in the interests of the people of this country.

Brexit should be about opportunity and hope. It should be a chance to do things differently, to be more nimble and dynamic, and to maximise the particular advantages of the UK as an open, outward-looking global economy.

That dream is dying, suffocated by needless self-doubt.

We have postponed crucial decisions – including the preparations for no deal, as I argued in my letter to you of last November – with the result that we appear to be heading for a semi-Brexit, with large parts of the economy still locked in the EU system, but with no UK control over that system.

It now seems that the opening bid of our negotiations involves accepting that we are not actually going to be able to make our own laws. Indeed we seem to have gone backwards since the last Chequers meeting in February, when I described my frustrations, as Mayor of London, in trying to protect cyclists from juggernauts. We had wanted to lower the cabin windows to improve visibility; and even though such designs were already on the market, and even though there had been a horrific spate of deaths, mainly of female cyclists, we were told that we had to wait for the EU to legislate on the matter.

So at the previous Chequers session, we thrashed out an elaborate procedure for divergence from EU rules. But even that seems to have been taken of the table and there is in fact no easy UK right of initiative. Yet if Brexit is to mean anything, it must surely give ministers and Parliament the chance to do things differently to protect the public. If a country cannot pass a law to save the lives of female cyclists – when that proposal is supported at every level of UK Government – then I don’t see how that country can truly be called independent.

It is also also clear that by surrendering control over our rulebook for goods and agrifoods (and much else besides) we will make it much more difficult to do free trade deals. And then there is the further impediment of having to argue for an impractical and undeliverable customs arrangement unlike any other in existence

Conversely, the British Government has spent decades arguing against this or that EU directive, on the grounds that it was too burdensome or ill-thought out. We are now in the ludicrous position of asserting that we must accept huge amounts of precisely such EU law, without changing an iota, because it is essential for our economic health – and when we no longer have any ability to influence these laws as they are made.

In that respect we are truly headed for the status of colony – and many will struggle to see the economic or political advantages of that particular arrangement.

It is also clear that by surrendering control over our rulebook for goods and agrifoods (and much else besides) we will make it much more difficult to do free trade deals. And then there is the further impediment of having to argue for an impractical and undeliverable customs arrangement unlike any other in existence.

What is even more disturbing is that this is our opening bid. This is already how we see the end state for the UK – before the other side has made its counter-offer. It is as though we are sending our vanguard into battle with the white flags fluttering above them. Indeed, I was concerned, looking at Friday’s document, that there might be further concessions on immigration, or that we might end up effectively paying for access to the single market.

On Friday I acknowledged that my side of the argument were too few to prevail, and congratulated you on at least reaching a Cabinet decision on the way forward. As I said then, the Government now has a song to sing. The trouble is that I have practised the words over the weekend and find that they stick in the throat. We must have collective responsibility. Since I cannot in all conscience champion these proposals, I have sadly concluded that I must go.

I am proud to have served as Foreign Secretary in your Government. As I step down I would like first to thank the patient officers of the Metropolitan Police who have looked after me and my family, at times in demanding circumstances.

I am proud too of the extraordinary men and women of our diplomatic service. Over the last few months they have shown how many friends this country has around the world, as 28 governments expelled Russian spies in an unprecedented protest at the attempted assassination of the Skripals. They have organised a highly successful Commonwealth summit and secured record international support for this Government’s campaign for 12 years of quality education for every girl, and much more besides. As I leave office, the FCO now has the largest and by far the most effective diplomatic network of any country in Europe – a continent which we will never leave.

Thank you for your letter relinquishing the ofﬁce of Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs.

I am sorry – and a little surprised – to receive it after the productive discussions we had at Chequers on Friday, and the comprehensive and detailed proposal which we agreed as a Cabinet. It is a proposal which will honour the result of the referendum and the commitments we made in our general election manifesto to leave the single market and the customs union. It will mean that we take back control of our borders, our laws, and our money – ending the freedom of movement, ending the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice in the United Kingdom, and ending the days of sending vast sums of taxpayers’ money to the European Union. We will be able to spend that money on our priorities instead – such as the £20 billion increase we have announced for the NHS budget, which means that we will soon be spending an extra £394 million a week on our National Health Service.

As I outlined at Chequers, the agreement we reached requires the full, collective support of Her Majesty’s Government. During the EU referendum campaign, collective responsibility on EU policy was temporarily suspended. As we developed our policy on Brexit, I have allowed Cabinet colleagues considerable latitude to express their individual views. But the agreement we reached on Friday marks the point where that is no longer the case, and if you are not able to provide the support we need to secure this deal in the interests of the United Kingdom, it is right that you should step down.

As you do so, I would like to place on record my appreciation of the service you have given to our country, and to the Conservative Party, as Mayor of London and as Foreign Secretary – not least for the passion that you have demonstrated in promoting a Global Britain to the world as we leave the European Union.

Yours ever,

Theresa May

May makes Jeremy Hunt Foreign Secretary after facing down rebel MPs and telling them they’ll make CORBYN PM as she AVOIDS a no confidence vote

Theresa May moved to reshuffle her frontbench team after a day of high political drama which threatened to bring her premiership crashing down.

Earlier she faced down her critics at a crunch meeting with her MPs – known as the 1922 committee – in Parliament, warning them they risk handing the keys of No10 to Jeremy Corbyn if they oust her.

Mr Johnson’s departure fuelled feverish discussion about whether mutinous Tory MPs will move to topple Mrs May by sending in letters of no confidence.

Jeremy Hunt (left) has been appointed Foreign Secretary while Matt Hancock (right) replaces him as Health Secretary

Jeremy Hunt seen leaving No10 after Foreign Office appointment

Who could succeed Theresa May as the next Prime Minister if she is ousted from No10?

Theresa May is battling to hang on as PM

Theresa May’s premiership is hanging in the balance after David Davis and Boris Johnson quit in a shock double cabinet resignation.

Here are the odds, via bookmakers Ladbrokes, on who will be the next PM:

Michael Gove (Environment Secretary) – 9/2

Has buried the hatchet with Mr Johnson after brutally ending his Tory leadership campaign in the wake of David Cameron’s resignation.

Thought to be less concerned with short term concessions that Mr Johnson, but focused on ensuring the UK is free from Brussels rules in the longer term.

Jeremy Corbyn (Labour leader) – 5/1

The labour leader will be hoping to capitalise on Brexit disarray in the Cabinet to seize power himself in an election

Sajid Javid (Home Secretary) – 5/1

Brought in to replace Amber Rudd after she resigned amid the Windrush scandal, Mr Javid was seen as a reluctant Remainer in the referendum.

Many thought the former high-flying banker would plump for the Leave campaign, but he eventually claimed to have been won over by the economic case. He is likely to focus be guided by evidence about trade calculations in discussions over how closely aligned the UK should be with the EU.

Jacob Rees-Mogg (Tory backbencher) – 6/1

A leading Tory backbencher, he is chairman of the European Research Group – the powerful group of backbench Brexit backing Tory MPs.

Boris Johnson (ex Foreign Secretary)- 8/1

The Brexit champion in the Cabinet until today, has been agitating for a more robust approach and previously played down the problems of leaving with no deal.

He is unhappy with plans for a tight customs arrangement with Brussels – warning that it could effectively mean being lashed to the EU indefinitely. Said to have bluntly dismissed concerns from pro-EU companies by saying ‘f*** business’.

Andrea Leadsom (Commons leader) – 12/1

A leading Brexiteer who ran for the leadership last year before pulling out allowing Theresa May to be crowned.

Jeremy Hunt (Health Secretary) – 14/1

A Remainer in the referendum campaign, Mr Hunt has since embraced the Brexiteer arguments – with speculation that he is positioning for a tilt at the top job should Mrs May be abruptly ousted. He has been heavily

Dominic Raab (Brexit Secretary) – 16/1

The new Brexit Secretary, Mr Raab is a leading Brexiteer who has been brought into the Cabinet after David Davis’ shock resignation.

David Davis (ex Brexit Secretary) – 25/1

A long-time Eurosceptic and veteran of the 1990s Maastricht battles, brought back by Mrs May in 2016 to oversee the day-to-day negotiations.

He has plunged her Government into chaos after sensationally quitting last night.

He has said the government will be seeking a ‘Canada plus plus plus’ deal from the EU.

But the PM has insisted that she will stay on and fight if a leadership contest is triggered.

The promotion of Mr Hunt – a Remainer who now says he would back Brexit – comes weeks after he secured a £20billion a year funding boost for the NHS to mark its 70th birthday.

Culture Secretary Matt Hancock will move to head up the health service, attorney general Jeremy Wright has become the new Culture Secretary while Brexiteer Geoffrey Cox is being made Attorney General in the shake-up.

Earlier this year Mr Hunt fended off efforts by the PM to move him from the health brief to become Business Secretary – telling her he was determined to stay on and finish the job he had set himself as Health Secretary.

It came hours after Mrs May promoted Brexiteer Tory MP Dominic Raab to the post of Brexit Secretary as Mr Davis’ replacement.

Unlike his predecessor, Mr Hunt backed Remain in the EU referendum – but he has said he would now vote for Brexit because he has grown fed up with the ‘arrogance’ of Brussels.

The PM moved to shore up her support among the Tory backbenches by defending her Brexit plans in the Commons chamber and a packed meeting of the parliamentary party which took place immediately afterwards.

She warned mutinous Tories threatening to mount a revolt to out her that they risk letting a hard left Corbyn- led Government.

And she was given a reprieve tonight with news she will not face an immediate vote of no confidence.

The rare bright spot for the PM came as she issued a defiant message at a stormy session of the Tory 1922 committee in Parliament, with her premiership hanging by a thread.

Mrs May told the gathering that ‘to lead is to decide’ and raised the prospect of the Labour leader imposing a left-wing revolution on the country.

And in a boost for the embattled PM, the chairman of the powerful 1922, Sir Graham Brady, is said to have confirmed at the session tonight that currently he has not received the 48 letters from MPs that would trigger a no-confidence vote.

After the meeting, solicitor general Robert Buckland told journalists that Mrs May had received strong support from the party rank-and-file.

He said: ‘She talked about Jeremy Corbyn, she talked about the alternative being to deliver the country to the sort of Government people didn’t vote for and any Conservative voter would be repelled by.’

Mr Buckland insisted Mrs May could emerge strengthened from the furore, comparing the turbulent events to the crises which faced German Chancellor Angela Merkel in her early years in office.

He said: ‘I think she is strengthened by all of this, I think it helps her.

‘The most striking remark she said was “to lead is to decide”.’

Tory MP Geoffrey Cox – a Brexiteer who has been promoted to Attorney General in today’s reshuffle – said many Eurosceptics inside the meeting urged the PM to stay on and lead them through Brexit.

He said: ‘I regret Boris and David have gone, but I think they were wrong – they should have stuck in and make this deal successful.’

He said the third way deal Mrs May has put forward represents a ‘giant step’ on the road to Brexit.’

But Jacob Rees-Mogg, a Tory MP and leader of the European Research Group – the powerful group of backbench Tory MPs – said the PM must ditch her Chequers plan.

He said: ‘You see that those supporting Remain two years ago are supporting quasi Remain now…the key question for today is does the rather bad Chequers deal go ahead.’

And he warned that if the Tory party splits along the two wings of Brexiteers vs Remainers – the fault will lie squarely with Downing Street.

He said: ‘If the Government plans to get the Chequers deal through on the back of Labour Party votes then that would be the most divisive thing it could do.

‘And it would be a split coming from the top, not from the members of Conservative party across the country.’

‘I can’t put my name to this’: How Boris finally quit after being asked to put his name to article DEFENDING Chequers Brexit summit deal

Boris Johnson’s dramatic resignation came after he refused to put his name to a Downing Street-drafted article supporting the Chequers agreement, it emerged last night.

Mr Johnson, who quit the Government yesterday, had appeared to have fallen into the line with the negotiating strategy announced on Friday evening – despite apparently referring to it as a ‘t**d’.

He was even said to have congratulated the PM at dinner for securing Cabinet agreement. But on Saturday he refused to sign off a joint newspaper article with the Remain-backing Chancellor Philip Hammond – a long term Remainer – supporting the deal.

A friend said Mr Johnson took one look at the article and said: ‘I can’t put my name to this.’ A text drafted by No 10 was passed to the Treasury, then sent on to the FCO on Saturday. But seeing the consequences of the deal in black and white made him realise he would have to quit, allies revealed.

Boris Johnson refused to put his name to a Downing Street-drafted article with Chancellor Philip Hammond supporting the Chequers agreement

‘At that point he knew it was indefensible,’ the friend said.

On Sunday a series of articles purporting to be written by Cabinet ministers supporting the deal were placed in newspapers. Both Mr Johnson and Brexit Secretary David Davis were conspicuous by their absence.

By yesterday, according to allies, Mr Johnson was ‘racked with doubt’ about whether to stay in the Cabinet at all and concluded he simply couldn’t improve the deal from inside government.

He telephoned Downing Street yesterday lunchtime and told them he planned to announce his resignation in the evening.

But No 10 refused to allow him that luxury and – in a clear attempt to spike his guns – made the unusual decision to announce his departure in a short statement at 3pm, before Mr Johnson had even finished composing his resignation letter.

It emerged hours later, warning that the UK was heading for a ‘Semi-Brexit’ as a ‘colony’ of Brussels and that the dream of the Leave campaign – to take back control of our democracy – was ‘dying’.

In her icy reply last night, the Prime Minister said she was ‘a little surprised’ to see Mr Johnson departing the Government after the Cabinet signed off on her deal at Chequers on Friday. She suggested he was going back on his word.

But after Mr Davis quit the Government at midnight, speculation quickly swirled around Westminster that Mr Johnson would follow. The rumours soon reached fever pitch when he failed to attend a meeting of the Government’s emergency Cobra committee at 1pm to discuss the Salisbury poisonings.

He had also been expected to host, but was notably absent from, the Western Balkans Summit in London’s Docklands yesterday afternoon, involving ministers from several EU states.

Instead, he spent the day locked in talks with advisers at his official residence, Carlton Gardens. As the atmosphere turned febrile, it was suggested No.10 had enraged Mr Johnson by offering his job to Mr Davis in a desperate attempt to get him to stay inside the Cabinet, something denied by Theresa May’s aides.

Allies of the Foreign Secretary insisted last night that neither this, nor leadership ambitions, was ultimately a factor in his decision to leave Indeed, when his resignation letter was finally released, it was a vivid deconstruction of the Prime Minister’s Brexit strategy. Savaging the PM’s Chequers deal, he said vast swathes of the economy would be ‘locked in’ to Brussels rules but with no influence over them.

He also launched a scathing attack on the PM personally, accusing her of being ‘suffocated by needless self doubt’ and of running up the white flag to Brussels.

And he warned this ‘disturbing’ opening bid could be followed by further concessions on immigration and money ‘for access to the single market’.

Unlike Mr Davis – who notably backed Mrs May staying in office in interviews yesterday – Mr Johnson made no such offers of support.

Mr Johnson wrote: ‘Brexit should be about opportunity and hope. It should be a chance to do things differently, to be more nimble and dynamic, and to maximise the particular advantages of the UK as an open, outward-looking global economy. That dream is dying, suffocated by needless self-doubt.’

Mr Johnson said the failure to prepare for ‘no deal’ means ‘we appear to be heading for a semi-Brexit, with large parts of the economy still locked in the EU system, but with no UK control over that system.’

And he condemned Mrs May’s customs proposals, the Facilitated Customs Arrangement, calling it an ‘impractical and undeliverable customs arrangement unlike any other in existence.’ In his letter, Mr Johnson accepted that on Friday he had congratulated the PM on ‘at least reaching a Cabinet decision on the way forward’. He then added: ‘As I said then, the Government now has a song to sing. The trouble is I have practised the words over the weekend and find that they stick in the throat.’

Last Thursday night, David Cameron made an extraordinary appeal to Mr Johnson not to resign.

The former prime minister, acting with the blessing of Mrs May, met for drinks with his fellow Old Etonian at a London club just hours before the make-or-break summit.

Last Wednesday other pro-Leave cabinet ministers met Mr Johnson in the Foreign Office as details of Mrs May’s proposals leaked out. Penny Mordaunt, Andrea Leadsom, Esther McVey, Liam Fox, Chris Grayling, Michael Gove and David Davis – as well as Gavin Williamson discussed the plan. A similar group met the next day to plan tactics for Chequers in an attempt to push an alternative plan.

Story 1: The People’s Freedom vs. The Elite’s Ruling New World Order Racket — British People Choose Freedom — American People Choose Freedom In November Outing President Obama and House Speaker Paul Ryan — Get The United Nations Out of United States and The United States Out of United Nations — Breakup The Rackets of The European Union and United Nations! — Dump House Speaker Paul Ryan and Hillary Clinton — Elect Trump — Three Cheers For The British People Who Voted For Brexit — Videos

Does the Brexit help Donald Trump?

Brexit Global Reaction: World markets and governments dismayed by anti-EU result

BREXIT THE MOVIE FULL FILM

BREXIT THE MOVIE is a feature-length documentary film to inspire as many people as possible to vote to LEAVE the EU in the June 23rd referendum.

EUROPEAN political chiefs are to take advantage of Brexit by unveiling their long-held plan to morph the continent’s countries into one GIANT SUPERSTATE, it has emerged today.

The foreign ministers of France and Germany are due to reveal a blueprint to effectively do away with individual member states in what is being described as an “ultimatum”.Under the radical proposals EU countries will lose the right to have their own army, criminal law, taxation system or central bank, with all those powers being transferred to Brussels.

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Controversially member states would also lose what few controls they have left over their own borders, including the procedure for admitting and relocating refugees.The plot has sparked fury and panic in Poland – a traditional ally of Britain in the fight against federalism – after being leaked to Polish news channel TVP Info.

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Polish politicians say the plans include loss of control of a number of key policy areas

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Polish foreign minister Witold Waszczykowski has blasted the plan

The public broadcaster reports that the bombshell proposal will be presented to a meeting of the Visegrad group of countries – made up of Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia – by German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier later today.Excerpts of the nine-page report were published today as the leaders of Germany, France and Italy met in Berlin for Brexit crisis talks.In the preamble to the text the two ministers write: “Our countries share a common destiny and a common set of values ??that give rise to an even closer union between our citizens. We will therefore strive for a political union in Europe and invite the next Europeans to participate in this venture.”The revelations come just days after Britain shook the Brussels establishment by voting to leave the European Union in a move some have predicted could leave to the break-up of the EU.

A number of member states are deeply unhappy about the creeping federalism of the European project with anti-EU sentiments running high in eastern Europe, Scandinavia and France.

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Opponents of the EU have warned of its ambitions to create a superstate

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Britain voted to leave the European Union in an historic referendum last Thursday

Responding to the plot Polish Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski raged: “This is not a good solution, of course, because from the time the EU was invented a lot has changed.“The mood in European societies is different. Europe and our voters do not want to give the Union over into the hands of technocrats.“Therefore, I want to talk about this, whether this really is the right recipe right now in the context of a Brexit.”There are deep divides at the heart of the EU at the moment over how to proceed with the project in light of the Brexit vote.

Some figures have cautioned against trying to force through further political integration, warning that to do so against the wishes of the European people will only fuel further Eurosceptic feeling.

This is not a good solution

Polish Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski

A few weeks before the Brexit vote European Council president Donald Tusk warned that European citizens did not share the enthusiasm of some of their leaders for “a utopia of Europe without conflicting interests and ambitions, a utopia of Europe imposing its own values on the external world, a utopia of Euro-Asian unity”.He added: “Increasingly louder are those who question the very principle of a united Europe. The spectre of a break-up is haunting Europe and a vision of a federation doesn’t seem to me to be the best answer to it.”His view was backed up by the leader of the eurozone countries, Dutch politician Jerome Dijsselbloem, who added: “In the eurozone some are pushing for a completion of the monetary union by creating a full political union, a euro area economic government or even a euro budget… to me it is obvious.“We need to strengthen what we have and finish it, but let’s not build more extensions to the European house while it is so unstable.”
Meanwhile Lorenzo Condign, the former director general of Italy’s treasury, has said it is nearly impossible to see Europe opting for more integration at such a time of upheaval.He said: “It seems difficult to imagine that the rest of the EU will close ranks and move in the direction of greater integration quickly. Simply, there is no political will.“Indeed, the risk is exactly the opposite – namely that centrifugal forces will prevail and make integration even more difficult.”But others see the Brexit vote as an opportunity to push ahead with the European elite’s long-cherished dream of creating a United States of Europe.

Spain’s foreign minister Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo has called for “more Europe” whilst Italy’s finance minister, Carlo Padoan, is advocating a common budget for the eurozone states.

And Emmanuel Macron, France’s economy minister, wants to go even further and set up a common eurozone treasury which would oversee the permanent transfer of funds from wealthier northern Europe to shore up Mediterranean economies

by MATTHEW BOYLE 24 Jun 2016

The globalist movement is on the run as the British people on Thursday voted to “Leave” the European Union.

The vote to Brexit—a hard-fought campaign by nationalist populists in the United Kingdom—puts the world elite on their heels, as a similar but bigger and stronger such movement is brewing right here in the United States.

Donald J. Trump, the presumptive 2016 GOP presidential nominee, has run a campaign so far—and since winning the nomination—focused squarely on the exact same issues that the Leave campaigners ran on in the United Kingdom. Uncontrolled migration, out-of-whack trade deals, national sovereignty, popular control of government, and rejection of world elites are what propelled Leave campaigners to a stunning victory in the United Kingdom. Those same issues are what has propelled Trump to a similarly shocking victory over 16 other Republican presidential candidates in the primaries, where he—as Breitbart News has documented—received millions more votes than anyone else who has ever won the GOP nomination has.

They also set the stage for the 2016 general election. Trump has not shown a sign of backing down at all, on any of this, and in his speech earlier in the week laying out the case against Hillary Rodham Clinton—the presumptive 2016 Democratic presidential nominee, his opponent in November—he set the stage for this battle.

“Everywhere I look, I see the possibilities of what our country could be. But we can’t solve any of these problems by relying on the politicians who created them,” Trump said in his Tuesday address. “We will never be able to fix a rigged system by counting on the same people who rigged it in the first place. The insiders wrote the rules of the game to keep themselves in power and in the money.”

Throughout the speech, Trump excoriated Clinton for her ties to the world’s international elite—citing Peter Schweizer’s Clinton Cash to detail how she and her husband, former U.S. President Bill Clinton, “used the State Department to enrich their family at America’s expense.”

“She gets rich making you poor,” Trump said of Hillary Clinton, talking directly to the voters.

The matching themes of Trump’s campaign, and the successful Brexit campaign in the United Kingdom, are in large part why Trump’s well-timed trip to Scotland—purportedly for opening a golf course with his children, but seemingly because of the Leave success—makes him the captain of an international populist rejection of the world’s elite.

Trump seized the mantle of the movement on Friday morning in Scotland, embracing the populism that has propelled him this far and sustained him even as the most sinister and brutal of attacks come his way from inside his own party and from the other side.

“This is an amazing honor,” Trump said on Friday, almost taking credit for Brexit. After noting Brexit won, and by a bigger margin than pundits, analysts, and prognosticators could have ever predicted, Trump noted that the will of the public is all powerful.

“It’s always the will of the people ultimately that wins out,” Trump said.

As Trump soars back into the United States riding the populist wave on high, he will over the next several months seek to define his general election opponent—Hillary Clinton—correctly as the face of the global elite that the British voters just defeated. The lies, smears, and false alarms that Remain campaigners pushed out as part of a giant misinformation campaign designed to deceive the public into choosing against Leave all failed.

Those same misinformation campaign tactics are coming into focus here in the United States against Trump. High dollar donors are spending millions on attack ads. The mainstream media is inaccurately calling him a racist, a xenophobe, a sexist, and painting a grossly unfair and wrong picture of Trump as a buffoon who has no idea what he’s doing and would be a disaster for the economy and world security. That is the George Soros playbook, the exact same type of campaign the Remain folks in the United Kingdom ran against Leave campaigners.

Perhaps, despite serious concerns over his competence, Leave campaign’s Boris Johnson summed it up best during the BBC debate earlier this week:

At the end of this campaign, I think you’ll agree: There is a very clear choice between those on their side who speak of nothing but fear of the consequences of leaving the EU, and we on our side who offer hope. Between those who have been endlessly rubbishing our country and running it down, and those of us who believe in Britain. They say we can’t do it. We say we can. They say we have no choice but to bow down to Brussels. We say they are woefully underestimating this country and what it can do. If we vote Leave, we can take back control of our borders and huge sums of money—10 billion pounds a year net—of our tax raising powers, of our trade policies, and of our whole lawmaking system. The democracy that is the foundation of our prosperity and if we stand up for democracy we will be speaking up for hundreds of millions of people around Europe who agree with us but who currently have no voice. And if we vote Leave and take back control, I believe that this Thursday could be our country’s Independence Day.

Johnson lifted the Independence Day line from Nigel Farage of the U.K. Independence Party—also a Leave campaigner—and an actual leader of the populist movement who has been banging the drum on the issue for 25 years.

Trump struck a similar note in his New York City speech exposing Clinton:

Come November, the American people will have a chance to issue a verdict on the politicians that have sacrificed their security, betrayed their prosperity, and sold out their country. They will have a chance to vote for a new agenda with big dreams, bold ideas and enormous possibilities for the American people. Hillary Clinton’s message is old and tired. Her message is that things can’t change. My message is that things have to change – and this is our one chance, and maybe our only chance, to do that change. If we don’t do it now, folks, I don’t know that we’ll ever, ever have another chance. We have to have change, but real change—not Obama change.

What the Leave campaigners did in the United Kingdom—and what Trump is doing here—is taking the moral high ground away from the global elitists. Trump is turning Hillary Clinton into the “no you can’t” candidate, just as Leave campaigners framed the Remain campaigners as those holding Britain back.

The next several months leading up to the United States’ own presidential election are going to be some of the most brutal in U.S. political history. Hillary Clinton and her globalist allies are going to pull out every trick in the book—and more—to protect the face of the world elite. Clinton is their icon, their last hope to maintain control. The mud they will sling at Trump—from the Democratic Party, from Clinton’s campaign itself, and from outside allies like Super PACs and from the media—will be the worst anyone of us on the right has ever seen. But, if Trump can continue framing the election in this light and ride this wave, he could just soar right on through it and above it into the White House.

Populist nationalism has won U.S. House campaigns, U.S. Senate campaigns, and various other smaller ball political battles around the country and around the world. It can even win, as it helped Trump do when he roundly defeated some of the most talented governors and Senators in the primaries — a U.S. presidential primary. What Brexit shows is that populist nationalism can win national general elections, as it just did in the United Kingdom. That has the world elite fearing, and rallying around Clinton as we speak. Now that populist nationalism can win, and has won national general elections, is it only logical that Brexit 2.0 pumps Trump up into the White House? We shall see, come November.

It wasn’t me! Obama shrugs off his humiliating failure to stop Britain quitting Europe by claiming ‘globalization’ was to blame for shock result

White House attempted to calm choppy global waters on Friday brought on by Britain’s spectacular decision to leave the European Union

The president, on the West Coast for a summit and fundraising events, said in a speech he talked Prime Minister David Cameron

He also spoke to German Chancellor Angela Merkel – they agreed the US and the EU will ‘work closely together in the weeks and months ahead.’

Obama had publicly aligned himself with Prime Minister David Cameron – who is resigning – in the fight to keep the EU intact

In the race for the White House, Hillary Clinton joined Obama on the side of the ‘remain’ campaign and Donald Trump urged Britain to ‘leave’

Vice President Joe Biden was in Ireland, receiving an honorary doctorate; he said in his speech, ‘I must say we had looked for a different outcome’

By FRANCESCA CHAMBERS, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT FOR DAILYMAIL.COM

PUBLISHED: 07:07 EST, 24 June 2016 | UPDATED: 21:02 EST, 24 June 2016

President Barack Obama says he spoke to British Prime Minister David Cameron on the phone today, and he is ‘confident’ after their discussion that the United Kingdom ‘is committed to an orderly transition’ out of the European Union.

Obama said that the United States will remain in close contact with Britain, and their economic and financial teams will ‘stay focused on ensuring economic growth and financial stability.’

He also spoke to German Chancellor Angela Merkel, he said, and they agreed the US and the EU will also ‘work closely together in the weeks and months ahead.’

‘I do think that yesterday’s vote speaks to the ongoing changes and challenges that are raised by globalization,’ Obama said in his opening remarks at Stanford University’s annual Global Entrepreneurship Summit.

Obama had publicly aligned himself with Cameron in the fight to keep the EU intact, an unusual intervention in another country’s politics at the invitation of its leader of the moment.

Heattempted to calm choppy global waters on Friday afternoon brought on by Britain’s spectacular decision to leave the EU by promising that the United Kingdom’s relationship with the United States would remain the same.

President Barack Obama says he spoke to British Prime Minister David Cameron on the phone today, and he is ‘confident’ after their discussion that the United Kingdom ‘is committed to an orderly transition’ out of the European Union

As a result of the vote, Britain’s relationship with the EU will change, Obama assessed at Stanford. ‘One thing that will not change is the special relationship that exists between our two nations.’

The president said in a statement that both the UK and the EU would continue to be ‘indispensable partners’ and touted the former’s involvement in NATO as an example of Western stability in face of tumbling worldwide markets.

‘The people of the United Kingdom have spoken, and we respect their decision,’ he said in a statement.

On the West Coast for a summit and fundraising events, Obama did not immediately speak to Cameron on Friday. In the interim, the White House offered no formal declaration of policy as the pound plunged and the stock market crashed abroad.

At Stanford, Obama had little to say about how the vote will affect the United States’ trade partnership with Britain, now that it will soon exit the EU.

It will need to ink a new deal with the United States, he warned in April, and that could take months, and even years.

The referendum result was as much a smack down of the U.S. president as it was the British prime minister, who said this morning that he would resign in October.

‘David has been an outstanding friend and partner on the global stage,’ Obama said today of Cameron, whom he closer with than any other world leader.

Obama said that the United States will remain in close contact with Britain, and their economic and financial teams will ‘stay focused on ensuring economic growth and financial stability’

The U.S. president had publicly aligned himself with Cameron in the fight to keep the EU intact, an unusual intervention in another country’s politics at the invitation of its leader of the moment

esident Joe Biden was in Ireland on Friday, receiving an honorary doctorate from Trinity College Dublin. ‘I must say we had looked for a different outcome,’ Biden said of Brexit

Officially in California for the Global Entrepreneurship Summit, with two Democratic fundraising events lined up later in the day, the U.S. president waited until the event at Stanford – a speech and discussion with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg – to offer a televised comment on the shocking world event.

Hours after the vote totals poured in the White House issued a statement on Obama’s behalf that asserted, ‘The special relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom is enduring, and the United Kingdom’s membership in NATO remains a vital cornerstone of U.S. foreign, security, and economic policy.

‘So too is our relationship with the European Union, which has done so much to promote stability, stimulate economic growth, and foster the spread of democratic values and ideals across the continent and beyond.’

The chief executive of the United States promised that both parties ‘will remain indispensable partners of the United States even as they begin negotiating their ongoing relationship to ensure continued stability, security, and prosperity for Europe, Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and the world.’

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) following news that the United Kingdom has voted to leave the European Union. The Dow Jones industrial average quickly fell nearly 500 points on the news with markets around the globe plunging

How Brexit could affect Americans right now

Britain voted 52 percent to 48 percent to leave the EU on Thursday, shocking the world and electrocuting the financial markets

WHITE HOUSE ON CAMERON CALL

President Obama spoke by phone today with Prime Minister David Cameron of the United Kingdom to discuss the outcome of yesterday’s referendum on membership in the European Union, in which a majority of British voters expressed their desire to leave the EU.

The President assured Prime Minister Cameron that, in spite of the outcome, the special relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom, along with the United Kingdom’s membership in NATO, remain vital cornerstones of U.S. foreign, security, and economic policy.

The President also expressed his regret at the Prime Minister’s decision to step aside following a leadership transition and noted that the Prime Minister has been a trusted partner and friend, whose counsel and shared dedication to democratic values, the special relationship, and the Transatlantic community are highly valued.

The President also observed that the EU, which has done so much to promote stability, stimulate economic growth, and foster the spread of democratic values and ideals across the continent and beyond, will remain an indispensable partner of the United States.

The President and Prime Minister concurred that they are confident that the United Kingdom and the EU will negotiate a productive way forward to ensure financial stability, continued trade and investment, and the mutual prosperity they bring.

Britain voted 52 percent to 48 percent to leave the EU on Thursday, shocking the world and electrocuting the financial markets.

Vice President Joe Biden was in Ireland on Friday, receiving an honorary doctorate from Trinity College Dublin.

‘I must say we had looked for a different outcome. We would have preferred a different outcome,’ he said in his speech, ‘but the United States has a long-standing friendship with the United Kingdom and that very special bond will endure.’

Biden added, ‘We fully respect the decision they have made.’

Obama warned at at a joint news conference with Cameron in April that the UK would be sent to ‘the back of the queue’ if it voted to leave the 28-nation arrangement and go its own way.

‘Maybe some point down the line, there might be a UK-U.S. trade agreement, but it’s not going to happen anytime soon,’ Obama said, ‘because our focus is in negotiating with a big bloc, the European Union, to get a trade agreement done.’

The US president added, ‘The UK is going to be in the back of the queue — not because we don’t have a special relationship — but because, given the heavy lift on any trade agreement, us having access to a big market with a lot of countries rather than trying to do piecemeal trade agreements is hugely inefficient.

Obama justified his toiling with the EU by casting the possible Brexit as a US security matter.

‘What happens in Europe is going to have an impact here,’ he said at the news conference at No. 10. ‘And what happens in Europe is going to have an impact in the United States.’

Like Obama, Hillary Clinton, the next Democratic nominee, had urged Britain to ‘remain’ in the EU. She echoed again echoed Obama in a statement – released after the White House had finally spoken – that said, ‘We respect the choice the people of the United Kingdom have made’

Obama warned at at a joint news conference with Cameron in April that the UK would be sent to ‘the back of the queue’ if it voted to leave the 28-nation arrangement and go its own way

‘He came in and really tried to convince people to stay, and I thought it was inappropriate,’ said Trump, who threw his lot in with the ‘leave’ faction. ‘And I actually think that his recommendation perhaps caused it to fail.’

At a press conference that officially marked the reopening of his Turnberry golf course in Scotland, Trump said Obama is ‘constantly dictating to the world what they should do.

WHITE HOUSE ON MERKEL CALL

The President spoke today by phone with Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany regarding the British people’s decision to leave the European Union.

Both said they regretted the decision but respected the will of the British people.

The two leaders agreed that the economic and financial teams of the G-7 partners will coordinate closely to ensure all are focused on financial stability and economic growth.

The President and the Chancellor affirmed that Germany and the EU will remain indispensable partners of the United States.

The leaders also noted that they looked forward to the opportunity to underscore the strength and enduring bond of transatlantic ties at the NATO Summit in Warsaw, Poland, July 8-9.

‘The world doesn’t listen to him, obviously. You can see that from the vote.’

Trump promised the country’s closest ally that if he succeeds Obama, he’ll quickly negotiate a new trade deal with Britain.

‘That wouldn’t happen with me. They’ll always be at the front of the line,’ he said in reference to Obama’s ‘back of the queue’ comment in April.

Trump said, ‘They’ve been great allies. I was very surprised when I heard President Obama say that.’

The U.S. presidential election is in November. The sitting president does not leave office until two and a half months later.

Like Obama, Hillary Clinton, the next Democratic nominee, had urged Britain to ‘remain’ in the EU.

She again echoed Obama in a statement today – released after the White House had finally spoken – that said, ‘We respect the choice the people of the United Kingdom have made.’

‘Our first task has to be to make sure that the economic uncertainty created by these events does not hurt working families here in America. We also have to make clear America’s steadfast commitment to the special relationship with Britain and the transatlantic alliance with Europe.

Clinton said in the written statement: ‘This time of uncertainty only underscores the need for calm, steady, experienced leadership in the White House to protect Americans’ pocketbooks and livelihoods, to support our friends and allies, to stand up to our adversaries, and to defend our interests. It also underscores the need for us to pull together to solve our challenges as a country, not tear each other down.’

FULL WHITE HOUSE STATEMENT ON BREXIT

The people of the United Kingdom have spoken, and we respect their decision. The special relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom is enduring, and the United Kingdom’s membership in NATO remains a vital cornerstone of U.S. foreign, security, and economic policy.

So too is our relationship with the European Union, which has done so much to promote stability, stimulate economic growth, and foster the spread of democratic values and ideals across the continent and beyond.

The United Kingdom and the European Union will remain indispensable partners of the United States even as they begin negotiating their ongoing relationship to ensure continued stability, security, and prosperity for Europe, Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and the world.

Trump blasted Obama today: ‘He came in and really tried to convince people to stay, and I thought it was inappropriate,’ said Trump, who threw his lot in with the ‘leave’ faction. ‘And I actually think that his recommendation perhaps caused it to fail’

‘Hillary Clinton believes that transatlantic cooperation is essential, and that cooperation is strongest when Europe is united. She has always valued a strong United Kingdom in a strong EU. And she values a strong British voice in the EU,’ he told the Observer in April, a day after the Obama-Cameron presser.

Trump used it as a cudgel against her on Friday. He said, ‘She’s always misread everything…She’s misread this.’

‘The only reason she did it is because Obama wanted it,’ he said. Clinton ‘doubled down’ on what Obama said ‘and she did the same thing.’

‘And obviously, for the 219th time, they were wrong. They’re always wrong. And that’s the problem with them.’

House Speaker Paul Ryan refused on Thursday to get involved in the Brexit debate UK voters made their decision.

‘I’m going to do exactly what the president did not do and not weigh in on this, and send the signal to our great friends and allies in Britain that we stand with them regardless of what decision they make,’ Ryan said.

The GOP leader said today in a statement, ‘I respect the decision made by the people of the United Kingdom. The UK is an indispensable ally of the United States, and that special relationship is unaffected by this vote.’

They Got It Wrong: Swarms of Global Chatterers Misread Brexit

By Mark Niquette mniquette

A global cohort said before Thursday’s Brexit vote that Britain was unlikely to pull out of the European Union, the post-World War II international project that brought an unprecedented era of prosperity and peace. Yet some were led astray by the belief that free trade’s money and material goods outweighed nationalism and the tug of nostalgia.

Among those who were wrong about Brexit before the vote:

Politicians

Conservative U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron called the referendum, presumably confident he would win. He lost, and he’s now resigning.

“Brits don’t quit,” Cameron said in an impassioned plea on Tuesday to voters to support remaining in the EU. “We get involved, we take a lead, we make a difference, we get things done.”

The Brits quit.

David Cameron

Photographer: Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg

Bettors

Opinion polls on Brexit were all over the place; the theoretical lead had changed hands dozens of times since September, although “leave” never reached 50 percent support. Still, betting odds put the chance of remaining at 90 percent as the polls closed on Thursday. Ladbrokes was offering 4-to-1 on a leave vote, according to The Guardian.

Even though most players in the market were actually backing leave, more money was bet on remain by the affluent, who were generally behind staying, Matthew Shaddick, head of political betting at Ladbrokes, wrote in a blog post. Bookies are trying to make money, not help people forecast results, so the vote worked out fine for Ladbrokes, he said.

“Is this just one of the inevitable, normal occasions where an outsider wins, or a fatal blow to the idea of betting markets as being a useful forecasting tool?” Shaddick said. “Maybe unsurprisingly, I tend to think the former, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have to reflect on all of their potential flaws and decide how we best interpret them in the future.”

The Chattering Class

The London-based Political Studies Association surveyed members, journalists, academics and pollsters from May 24 to June 2. Every group got it wrong.

Overall, 87 percent of respondents said Britain was more likely to stay in the EU, 5 percent said it was likely to leave, and 8 percent said both sides had an exactly equal chance.

“Any ‘expert’ who makes a prediction at this stage, and within the context of the current volatility of politics in the U.K. and abroad, ain’t no expert!” one respondent said, according to a June 3 report.

Protesters gather in Westminster.

Photographer: Mike Kemp/In Pictures via Getty Images

Historians

Matt Qvortrup, professor of political science at Coventry University and author of two books about referendums, analyzed all 49 plebiscites on EU-related issues since 1972. He calculated that Britain would narrowly vote to remain, based on the U.K.’s levels of economic growth, inflation, and the number of years spent in office by the government.

“The indications and predictions based on previous referendums still suggest that the United Kingdom will stay in the European Union,” Qvortrup wrote in a blog posting in April. “But the margin will be very close indeed, and neither side will be able to claim a decisive victory.”

Financiers

Societe Generale SA saw the risk of Brexit at 45 percent, according to analysts including Brian Hilliard, its chief U.K. economist. The risks of Brexit had diminished, though, according to betting odds and the polls, strategist Jason Simpson wrote in a May 20 note.

Barclays Plc analysts had said the baseline scenario was that the U.K. wouldn’t leave, and Nomura saw only about a 25 percent likelihood the U.K. would quit, analysts said in a May 11 note. Credit Suisse Group AG expected the U.K. to stay, analysts including Neville Hall wrote in a May 19 research note.

Traders watch computer screens in London.

Photographer: Jason Alden/Bloomberg

Political Clairvoyants

Even “superforecasters” got it wrong.

The consultancy Good Judgment Inc. regularly convenes a group of 150 people around the world with track records of successful predictions to prognosticate on various issues of the day. The aggregated probability estimates from the panel showed just a 24 percent chance of U.K. voters deciding to leave, according to a posting on Twitter on Thursday.

“I would say, ‘Expect the status quo’ reasonably confidently,” one of the forecasting panel, Michael Story, said last month.

UK ‘Leave’ vote deflates hopes for U.S.-EU trade deal

By David Lawder

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Britain’s looming exit from the European Union is another huge setback for negotiations on a massive U.S.-EU free trade deal that were already stalled by deeply entrenched differences and growing anti-trade sentiment on both sides of the Atlantic.

The historic divorce launched by Thursday’s vote will almost certainly further delay substantial progress in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) talks as the remaining 27 EU states sort out their own new relationship with Britain, trade experts said on Friday.

With French and German officials increasingly voicing skepticism about TTIP’s chances for success, the United Kingdom’s departure from the deal could sink hopes of a deal before President Barack Obama leaves office in January.

“This is yet another reason why TTIP will likely be postponed,” said Heather Conley, European program director at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank in Washington.

“But to be honest, TTIP isn’t going anywhere, I believe, before 2018 at the earliest,” she said.

U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman said in a statement on Friday that he was evaluating the UK decision’s impact on TTIP, but would continue to engage with both European and UK counterparts.

“The importance of trade and investment is indisputable in our relationships with both the European Union and the United Kingdom,” Froman said. “The economic and strategic rationale for T-TIP remains strong.”

TTIP negotiators are still expected to meet in Brussels in mid-July as scheduled, but those talks were aimed at focusing on less controversial issues while leaving the thorniest disagreements for U.S. and EU political leaders to resolve. And it is unclear when Britain will launch formal separation proceedings, which will take at least two years.

But analysts said both sides have been reluctant to put their best offers on the table with a new U.S. president due to take office in January and French and German leadership elections nearing in 2017.

The Brexit also will preoccupy EU officials in coming months as they launch their own negotiations with London over the future terms of UK-EU trade, and sort out their post-Brexit priorities, said Hosuk Lee-Makiyama, director of the European Centre for International Political Economy, a Brussels-based think tank.

Britain’s departure could leave U.S. negotiators facing a European side that is more dug-in on some issues, said Chad Bown, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, a think tank in Washington.

“As the UK is part of the coalition of liberal trading economies in the EU, the U.S. is losing one of the more like-minded countries from the group in Brussels sitting on the other side of the negotiating table,” said Bown, a former World Bank economist.

However, Lee-Makiyama, who also sees little chance of a deal before 2018, said Britain’s departure could eliminate one source of disagreement because the UK has insisted on a financial services chapter in the trade deal.

“The only real proponent of banking regulation in TTIP is the UK. Germany and France are probably willing to let it go,” he said. “It still leaves about 20 outstanding issues at nearly the same level of difficulty.”

The TTIP negotiations, which started three years ago, have unable to settle major differences over agriculture, where the EU side has shown little willingness to alter food safety rules that prohibit American beef raised with hormones or genetically modified foods, or open its closely guarded geographical food naming rules, such as for Asiago and feta cheeses.

European negotiators have complained that the United States has offered too little to open up its vast federal, state and local government procurement markets to European vendors with “Buy American” preferences in place.

Europe also wants access to key U.S. sectors such as maritime transport and aviation, while American negotiators have been frustrated over lack of access to some 200 European sectors ranging from healthcare to education.

The two sides also are far apart on how to resolve disputes. The U.S. side favors a traditional binding arbitration approach, while the Europeans want a court-like system that allows for appeals.

More progress has been made on harmonizing regulations for things like car seat belt anchors, clothes labeling and pharmaceutical inspections.

Brexit: Britain Votes with Trump, against Hillary, Obama

by JOEL B. POLLAK

British voters chose to “leave” the European Union on Thursday, defying the polls — and President Barack Obama, who had urged Britain to “remain” in the EU. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had also urged Britain to stay in the EU. Only Donald Trump had backed the campaign to leave.

Republican strategists had panned Trump’s decision to travel to the UK in the midst of campaign turmoil, and in the wake of his blistering attack on Hillary Clinton earlier this week.

Now, however, it looks like a risk that paid off handsomely, in the currency of foreign policy credibility.

Obama’s advice may have pushed some voters to “leave.” In April, he warned British voters they would be at the “back of the queue” in trade with the U.S. if they left the EU. Some, like Andrew Roberts, took offense, writing in the Wall Street Journal:

Surely—surely—this is an issue on which the British people, and they alone, have the right to decide, without the intervention of President Obama, who adopted his haughtiest professorial manner when lecturing us to stay in the EU, before making the naked threat that we would be sent “to the back of the queue” (i.e., the back of the line) in any future trade deals if we had the temerity to vote to leave.

Was my country at the back of the line when Winston Churchill promised in 1941 that in the event of a Japanese attack on the U.S., a British declaration of war on Japan would be made within the hour?

…

Were we at the back of the line on 9/11, or did we step forward immediately and instinctively as the very first of your allies to contribute troops to join you in the expulsion of the Taliban, al Qaeda’s hosts, from power in Afghanistan?

Or in Iraq two years later, was it the French or the Germans or the Belgians who stood and fought and bled beside you? Whatever views you might have over the rights or wrongs of that war, no one can deny that Britain was in its accustomed place: at the front of the line, in the firing line. So it is not right for President Obama now to threaten to send us to the back of the line.

Hillary Clinton also backed a “remain” vote in April, with a senior policy adviser issuing a statement on her behalf:

Hillary Clinton believes that transatlantic cooperation is essential, and that cooperation is strongest when Europe is united. She has always valued a strong United Kingdom in a strong EU. And she values a strong British voice in the EU.

Trump, who happens to be in Scotland to open a golf resort, promised in May that leaving the EU would not put Britain at the “back of the queue,” and said: “I think if I were from Britain I would probably want to go back to a different system.” He reiterated that support last week, telling the Sunday Times: “I would personally be more inclined to leave, for a lot of reasons like having a lot less bureaucracy. … But I am not a British citizen. This is just my opinion.”

As dawn broke over a shocked Brussels, a group of European MEPs warned that last night’s astonishing Brexit vote will cause the EU to ‘crumble to pieces’ within the next five years.

Their statement came as Britain voted to leave the EU, contrary to all projections by pollsters, to the bewilderment of the Eurocrats in Brussels.

‘This is the beginning of the end for the EU,’ Peter Lundgren, an MEP from the far-Right Sweden Democrat party, told MailOnline. ‘So many other countries will follow the UK. Europe will fall.’

Shattering: European MEPs warned that last night’s astonishing Brexit vote will cause the EU to ‘crumble to pieces’ within the next five years

Resign: An emotional David Cameron resigning this morning as Samantha Cameron looks on, as Brussels scrambled to make sense of Britain’s decision to exit and MEPs warned Europe will crumble

European Council President Donald Tusk prepares to address a media conference at the EU Council building in Brussels today

Message for Britain: Graffiti on a wall in at a Deutsche Post location at Hallisches Ufer in Berlin after the shock Brexit result

Far right: Today French far-Right leader Marine le Pen changed her twitter symbol to the Union Jack in a sign of how Brexit will increase support for the far-Right in France

Now France needs its own referendum too, says Marine Le Pen

The Eurosceptic MEPs from Sweden, Germany, Italy and France said a number of governments will now be under intense pressure to hold referendums of their own, and try to renegotiate their own individual deals.

This, they said, will lead to a ‘domino effect’ in the wake of Britain’s trailblazing and unprecedented decision to leave the EU.

‘The EU cannot survive. It is too undemocratic, corruption is too high, the Eurocrats’ ambition is too much, there is too much money in the gravy train. ‘It makes ordinary people raving mad.

‘It’s just a matter of time,’ Lundgren said. ‘Britain has set a precedent. Other member states will follow and the whole thing will fall apart. It will happen very soon.’

Overnight, as it became apparent that Britain was turning against the EU establishment, Brussels Eurocrats gradually left the bars around the parliament building and went home to bed.

Several British apparatchiks were concerned about their livelihood, with one telling MailOnline that he was expecting ‘to be on the scrapheap in the morning’.

The Commission and European Parliament buildings remained deserted, but a number of lights burned on the upper floors as a small number of desperate bureaucrats tried to lay the groundwork for a response to the most momentous event in the Union’s history.

Last night’s extraordinary vote was a reflection of the support for Eurosceptic parties that has been steadily growing across Europe in recent years, including for the populist and far-Right movements.

The Sweden Democrats – which started as a white supremacist party before sanitising its image – became the country’s third-largest party in 2014, and topped opinion polls last year.

Donald Tusk determined to keep EU unity after Brexit

Italy, Holland, Austria and other countries also have significant Eurosceptic followings, forming a wave of cynicism towards the EU and its cosseted elites

Collapse: MEPs Marco Zanni and Peter Lundgren claimed today that the European Union will now crumble

Panic: European Parliament President Martin Schultz, right, meets with presidents of political parties at the European Parliament in Brussels today amid deep shock over the Brexit result

European Council President Donald Tusk briefs the media after Britain voted to leave the European Union. Meanwhile Beatrix von Storch, right, said it was only a matter of time before the European Project fell apart

HOW BREXIT CONTAGION COULD SPREAD

SWEDEN: Polls have consistently shown that a majority of Swedes wish to stay in the EU. However, when considering a Europe without Britain, surveys produce a very different result, with at least one poll showing more Swedes determined to enact a ‘Swexit’.

FRANCE: On Tuesday, Marine Le Pen, the leader of the Front National, called for a French referendum modelled on the British vote. ‘I would vote for Brexit, even if I think that France has 1,000 more reasons to leave than the UK,’ she said, referring to the EU as ‘decaying’.

With French elections approaching, the issue is likely to become more contentious than ever.

ITALY: Earlier this month, the populist Five Star movement vowed it would demand a referendum on membership of the Euro, which would lead to a full-scale vote on EU membership.

Beppe Grillo, the party’s leader, said: ‘The mere fact that a country like Great Britain is holding a referendum on whether to leave the EU signals the failure of the EU.’

NETHERLANDS: According to the latest polls, most voters are in favour of a referendum on EU membership, with far-Right politicians like Geert Wilders agitating for a ‘Nexit’. In the aftermath of the Brexit decision, his will be a difficult demand for the Dutch government to ignore.

In France, the Front National is now finishing first in elections, and in Germany, Alternative Für Deutschland has more than 20,000 members.

Italy, Holland, Austria and other countries also have significant Eurosceptic followings, forming a wave of cynicism towards the EU and its cosseted elites.

Britain’s vote to leave will be seen as a huge boost for the Eurosceptics and populists, who have long argued that the Brussels elite are out of touch with the will of the people. Among them are inevitably a number of far-Right parties.

‘Our support is growing all over Europe,’ Lundgren said. ‘The EU cannot survive. It is too undemocratic, corruption is too high, the Eurocrats’ ambition is too much, there is too much money in the gravy train.

‘It makes ordinary people raving mad. People are gradually realising what’s going on. Britain has now started the process, and Europe will be fully dismantled by another country.’

Jeppe Koford, a mainstream Danish politician who leads the Social Democrats in the European Parliament, admitted that the EU was in dire straits but thought it was ‘too early to make that judgment’.

He said: ‘It’s not the UK referendum that could make Europe fall apart. It’s the lack of solutions to problems, whether its low wages, high unemployment or the terrorist threat,’ he said.

‘These are the main drivers of disintegration, if we’re not strong enough.’

But Beatrix von Storch, an MEP from Germany’s Alternative Für Deutschland, argued that Britain’s stunning decision would ‘start a process that can’t be stopped’, and had turned the EU upside down.

‘Let’s not forget that even those who voted to remain didn’t like the EU much,’ she said. ‘Remain campaigners kept repeating “the EU is not perfect”. They didn’t passionately believe in it, they have just been scared into supporting it.

‘Cameron’s renegotiation was going towards the Eurosceptic side, showing that even the people who are too scared to vote to leave the EU want less of it.’

German political parties give their views on the UK Leave vote

MEPs predict Brexit is the ‘beginning of the end’ and several countries will follow suit and hold a referendum, including Sweden, Germany and Italy

Cash crash: The FTSE opened 8 per cent down today as traders ran in fright from the shock Brexit result. Above, a trader sits in front of his screens, one which displays the rate of the British pound which drops against the US dollar

The EU’s failure to find solutions to the economic crisis, migration crisis and security crisis have all been blamed for the growing mistrust in Brussels

This, she said, reflected a Europe-wide disaffection with the EU that is growing year by year. ‘The process of the end has begun,’ she said. ‘Something has been started in Europe, and it cannot be stopped. Once one country is out, Europe will fall.’

Lundgren and von Storch are part of the Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy bloc, a populist grouping in the European Parliament containing many Ukip MEPs, including Nigel Farage.

Their analysis was questioned by the anti-extremism expert Vidhya Ramalingham, fellow at the German Institute on Radicalisation and De-Radicalisation Studies and Director of Moonshot CVE.

‘It’s an apocalyptic scenario which may not come about,’ she said. ‘It plays into the narrative that they are trying to promote. It’s fear mongering.’

She argued that the assumption that Europe would fall in response to Brexit was simply a way to sow division inside the EU. ‘It suits the Eurosceptic parties to make as much of it as possible,’ she said. ‘But the EU is stronger than that.’

Vote Leave supporters celebrate as a landslide victory in Sunderland points to final result – a win for Brexit

Cheers: Brexit supporters can’t contain their excitement as Britain votes Leave and triggers calls for a wave of similar referendums across Europe

Shock: The Remain camp is distraught as Brexit voters outnumber Remain by more than a million

But Marco Zanni, an Italian MEP from the Five Star movement who is also a member of the bloc, said that there were good reasons to predict the downfall of the EU.

He told MailOnline that the EU is facing ‘three crises at once’: the economic crisis, which has seen a bailout of Greece and deleterious growth across southern European countries; the migration crisis, which has caused the de facto suspension of the Schengen arrangement; and the security crisis, in which major attacks in Brussels and Paris have claimed hundreds of lives.

‘In each and every case, the EU is showing that it cannot solve these problems. It simply does not have the solutions, and people are getting fed up with it,’ he said.

‘In Italy, polls show disaffection with the EU skyrocketing. The majority is still in favour, but it is close to 50-50.

‘Italians are already agitating for a referendum. Last year, two hundred thousand Italians signed a petition demanding a referendum on our membership of the Euro, but it wasn’t granted.

‘The British referendum has given Italians an ambition to have a referendum as well.

‘There will be too much tension to hold the EU together. ‘It will collapse within the next 10 years.’

In France, the far-right National Front celebrated a Brexit ‘Victory’ and said it threatened the disintegration of the entire European project.

Marine Le Pen, the National Front (FN) leader, said the historic European Union vote was a clear indication the 28-nation bloc was ‘decaying’.

Calling for a referendum in her own country, and anticipating other exits across the EU, she said: ‘Victory for liberty!

‘As I’ve asked for many years, it is now necessary to have the same referendum in France and in the European Union.’

Marion Maréchal-Le Pen, another member of the Le Pen dynasty and an FN MP, also tweeted ‘Victory!’

What now: MEPs said disaffection with the EU was ‘skyrocketing’

The Le Pens, including the convicted racist and anti-Semite MEP and party founder Jean-Marie Le Pen, are fiercely anti-Europe.

They view an end to the EU as the best way of implementing their anti-immigration and anti-globalisation agenda.

Other parties in France, including the governing Socialists, were overwhelmingly shocked and saddened by the result.

President Francois Hollande had made it clear that a leave vote was ‘irreversible’, and that there will now be ‘extremely serious consequences’ for the UK.

Under the headline ‘The Immediate consequences for Britons’, L’Express said the millions who visit France from the UK every year would now need a visa.

Holidays on the continent will also be ‘more expensive’, and expats including retired people living in France will see agreements on their health treatment and other benefits scrapped.

Thousands of French people living and working in the UK will be reassessing their futures, along with Britons based in France.

L’Express also warned of more ‘frontiers going up’ around Europe, including one between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

Newspapers like Le Monde, meanwhile, highlighted ‘the collapse of Sterling’ and ‘panic in the markets’.

It described a ‘deeply divided’ Britain, with ‘large differences between the old and the young’.

Le Monde adds: ‘The focus on immigration, which has risen sharply, could accentuate the fractures in a country, also marked by a widening gap in wealth between the poor and the wealthy.’

Le Point also warned of a ‘domino effect’, saying the ‘terrible blow to the European project and the prime minister, David Cameron’ would have lasting negative effects.

Eva Joly, the French MEP, said the ‘jump into the dark’ by Britain, and a time of ‘great sadness’ for everyone in Europe.

Reduce Illegal Immigration at Borders

Reduce Illegal Jobs and Presence

Challenge Status Quo

Brexit Comes to America: Ryan Challenger Mounts Immigration Billboard

by JULIA HAHN 24 Jun 2016

Following last night’s historic Brexit vote, House Speaker Paul Ryan’s primary challenger, Wisconsin businessman Paul Nehlen, seems to have taken a page from the playbook of the U.K. Independence Party (UKIP) with the launch of a new billboard campaign.

On Friday morning, Nehlen’s campaign went live with a new billboard in Ryan’s hometown of Janesville, Wisconsin that is reminiscent of the distinctive UKIP-style campaign.

The billboard then directs viewers to Nehlen’s campaign website, ElectNehlen.com.

UKIP’s national billboard campaign is distinctive for its clear, straight-forward manner of describing the effects of large-scale migration and its impact on workers and Western culture.

“This is the first of many billboards our campaign will be launching to inform the voters about what’s at stake on August 9th,” Nehlen told Breitbart.

As Nehlen’s billboard suggests, Paul Ryan has a two-decade long history of pushing for open border immigration policies – including his 2015 effort to fund President Obama’s expansion to the U.S. refugee resettlement operation.

In speeches, Ryan has made the case for policies that would effectively dissolve U.S. borders — declaring that the U.S. “is more than [its] borders.” Ryan has even articulated his support for implementing an immigration system similar to the open borders policy of the European Union — calling for “an economic-based immigration system where… labor and supply can meet each other so we can help fuel our economy and create jobs.”

The phrase “labor supply and demand can meet each other,” is a centerpiece of open borders thought. Under this global, one-world theory, any willing employer should be able to hire any willing worker regardless of what country he or she lives in. This view, that America is an “idea” and not a “nation,” sees borders as an obstacle to commerce.

With regards to Islamic migration, Ryan’s controversial omnibus spending bill funded U.S. visas for nearly 300,000 (permanent and temporary) Muslim migrants in a single year.

He has repeatedly ruled out the possibility of making any cuts to Muslim migration— insisting that “that’s not who we are,” and that such a proposal is “not reflective of our principles.”

However, Ryan has not explained how importing hundreds of thousands of migrants from nations that hold sentiments that are anti-women, anti-gay, anti-religious tolerance, and anti-America benefits the United States or helps to protect our Western values.

Indeed, as a result of large-scale Muslim migration, the U.S. has imported several practices and values that are antithetical to Western principles.

For instance, Muslim migration has put half a million U.S. girls and women at risk of suffering the barbaric and misogynistic practice of Female Genital Mutilation, according to Equality Now.

Aayan Hirsi Ali has also observed that Islamic “honor violence” has become increasingly prevalent in the United States as a result of “a significant increase in the number of people moving to the United States from countries with high-honor violence rates —notably Somalia… as well as Iraq.”

A 2011 study by the Tahirih Justice Center titled, “Forced Marriage in Immigrant Communities in the United States” found that in the U.S. there are “as many as 3,000 known or suspected cases of [forced marriage],” identified by survey respondents in recent years.

The high rate of Islamic migration has also posed challenges to national security. As CBS has reported, “The Cedar-Riverside neighborhood of Minneapolis [which] is sometimes called ‘Little Mogadishu’” given that it is the “center of the nation’s largest concentration of Somalis,” has become a “fertile ground for Islamic terrorist groups recruiting new fighters.”

As the Minneapolis Star Tribune has reported, a Congressional report found that “Minnesota leads the nation in would-be ISIL terrorists from U.S.”

Moreover, evidence has shown that the recent Orlando terrorist attack, in which the son of Afghan migrants targeted the LGBT community and slaughtered 49 people in a gay nightclub, was motivated by anti-Western ideology that was imported from foreign nations rather than “homegrown.”

As Andrew McCarthy has explained, “The inspiration for Muslims to brutalize and mass murder gay people does not come from ISIS. It is deeply rooted in Islamic law, affirmed by many of Islam’s most renowned scholars.”

McCarthy explains that “the mandate that homosexuals be killed” comes from Sharia – not ISIS. “This is why, wherever sharia is the law, homosexuals are persecuted and killed,” McCarthy writes. “[With the Orlando terror attack] we have gotten another glimpse of radicalization, which is not “homegrown” but rather fueled by a foreign, anti-American, anti-liberty ideology.”

According to Pew, nearly all Muslims in Afghanistan (99 percent) support sharia law as official law. Between 2001 and 2014, the U.S. permanently resettled more than 40,000 migrants from Afghanistan on green cards.

Additionally, between 2001 and 2014, the U.S. permanently resettled 674,920 migrants from nations where gays can be executed, according to data from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

This figure does not include the total number of migrants the U.S. has permanently resettled from Muslim nations during that time, which is nearly 1.7 million.

The current rate of U.S. immigration is record high. Every day the U.S. admits enough net immigrants to fill an overcrowded, metropolitan high school. Every month the U.S. imports a population of immigrants that is larger than the occupancy of Lambeau Field, where the Green Bay Packers play.

Since Wisconsin voters sent Paul Ryan to Washington, the U.S. has imported a population of immigrants that is nearly three times larger than the entire population of Wisconsin.

In seven years time – unless Congress takes action to curb U.S. visa distributions – the foreign-born share of the U.S. population will reach an all-time high. In the 1920s, the last time the foreign-born share of the population reached a record high, then-President Calvin Coolidge hit the pause button for roughly fifty years, producing an era of explosive wage growth and allowing immigrants already in the country to assimilate.

Paul Ryan, however, has made clear that he does not wish to curb immigration, but instead has pushed legislation that would substantially increase immigration.

According to Pew polling data, 92 percent of the GOP electorate — and 83 percent of the American electorate as a whole — is opposed to such an agenda and wants to see immigration levels frozen or reduced. Ryan represents only a minuscule seven percent of the GOP electorate that wants to increase migration rates.

As NumbersUSA president Roy Beck has explained, “Open borders is in his [Paul Ryan’s] ideological DNA … He’s an ideologue and has spent his whole life working for ideologues. Open borders seeps out of every pore of his being … Ryan is the heart and soul of crony capitalism.”

Paul Ryan’s primary opponent: I’ll support Trump

When House Speaker Paul Ryan said Thursday he wasn’t ready to support Donald Trump, the presumptive nominee of the Republican Party, his Wisconsin primary opponent saw an opening.
Following the Trump campaign’s lash-out on Friday, Paul Nehlen seized that opening, suggesting he will do what Ryan won’t: support Trump.
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“If Mr. Trump is the nominee, I will support that decision, because it will have been the will of the voters that got him there,” the Republican challenging Ryan for Wisconsin’s 1st Congressional District seat in the state’s August primary said in a statement.
Nehlen is seeking to gain an edge in the primary against Ryan, who won his 2014 primary by nearly 90 percentage points. This time around, the Trump campaign and allies have aggressively attacked the House speaker and Republican National Convention chair, with Trump spokeswoman Katrina Pierson intimating that Ryan is unfit for his role if he can’t support the presumptive nominee.
But on Friday when Chuck Todd asked Pierson on “Meet the Press” if Trump would prefer to see Ryan remain speaker, she said “absolutely.” She said she had been stating her own opinion and not Trump’s.
“Mr. Trump is not out to get anyone here,” Pierson said. She also said that Trump would not back Nehlan even if Ryan refused to support him.
Trump himself called out Ryan in a tweet for claiming Trump “inherited” the Republican Party, highlighting that voters catapulted him atop the GOP ticket.
“Paul Ryan said that I inherited something very special, the Republican Party. Wrong, I didn’t inherit it, I won it with millions of voters!” Trump wrote on Twitter.

The nuance of his tweet speaks to the rift between mainstream Republicans and the polarizing, unconventional candidate who has risen to become the face of the party.
“Paul Ryan is right at the head of a small group of party elites who continue to tell the American people they know better,” Nehlen said. “He’s demonstrated that he’s not the unifier he claims. If he were a unifier, he would look for ways to work with the candidate that the American people have chosen in state after state.”
Nehlen argued that, despite Ryan’s calls for unity, his actions show he’s divisive, adding that Ryan isn’t supportive of Trump and wasn’t supportive of Ted Cruz or Rand Paul, either.
“It’s clear that he’s right out in front of the establishment’s #OnlyMe team. The people have spoken,” he said. “But Paul Ryan somehow thinks that the People are incompetent and that GOP elites should step in and guide them. The last time I checked, we lived in a representative republic. Paul Ryan seems to think we’re living in an oligarchy.”
Ryan said the onus is on Trump to unify the different wings of the party, a view Pierson pushed back on and Nehlen affirmed.
“Paul Ryan needs to be a — he’s the leader right now,” Pierson said. “We’re told Donald Trump is only the presumptive nominee. He’s not the nominee until 1,237. So really it’s incumbent on Paul Ryan to help bring unity to the party.”
Ryan’s office announced Friday afternoon that Ryan, Trump and Priebus will meet in Washington on Thursday of next week.
Nehlen’s move could give his campaign a boost, although Trump’s anti-establishment appeal in Wisconsin’s presidential primary wasn’t enough for the billionaire to win the state — or Ryan’s district, which was carried by Ted Cruz.
Conservative blogger Michelle Malkin endorsed Nehlen’s congressional campaign in April and will host a fundraiser for him in Wisconsin on May 27. http://www.politico.com/story/2016/05/paul-nehlen-support-donald-trump-paul-ryan-222908#ixzz4CbZe0Rzx